The Wizard of Oz

Who is running this show? Is there a man behind the curtain, and if so, why does he yank my levers like that? I mean, comon'. I got a heart and some brains, a bit of nerve too but it would be nice if they all worked together for a common goal instead of making me show up like the frazzled, frayed and floppy scarecrow that I was today.

Let's take this further. Shakespeare had something with that  all the worlds a stage bit. And yep, I am merely a player. Today I played the role of the angry, scowlee Woman #3 who is irrational and frustrated with all aspects of reality and shakes her fist alot. And my son of course plays the 'mewling infant' and frankly when I'm deep into that character I do feel badly for the tiny dude. Not that he was mistreated mind you, not the case.

But today was not so much filled with song and smiles. Oh but wait, to my credit I did sing "Over the Rainbow" to mr. tiny face this morning. Which makes this post all the more aptly named. But for the rest of the day it was a little more, 'How about a nap dude?'and 'Seriously? Eat again?'. My dear grandmother recommends going out of doors when this type of mood strikes and since I know she is regular reader (how great is that?) I will say for the record I thought. "I should go outside". And so Granny, I thought it. And well, we did see outside on the way to the car to go see a woman about a giant dinosaur costume. Because the mission is now pretty much full speed short film and I need a giant costume, basically a mascot sized dinosaur costume for this little movie. Something along these lines...

 

So we'll see if this kind of thing can be procured for less than 1200 dollars that this particular dino is pulling down. That would be nice since that number soars way out of our budget range. Does the fact that we need such a thing make you curious about our short film? Gooood.

Tonight when the BHB went to sleep and the cute hubs came home the relief came too. I think the reality is I got spoiled rotten by the double parent situation that went on there for 2 solid weeks on the trip. I know that soon enough we'll have some help because soon enough I'll be booked on a big job and soon enough that kid will be like 6 and off to school so believe me I know that I need to enjoy his ridiculous cuteness and drop my bad 'Woman #3' attitude. She's such a bit player and not important to this scene.

This photo documents a nap that sent me driving around town in order to make sure to preserve. It was a chunky 1.5 hour nap so perhaps worth the gas? I wasn't driving the whole time, I stopped and hung out in a parking lot at Whole Foods waiting for him to awake so we could go gather food for dinner. I will say that I did get to observe the sunset warm-up with silhouette-ee palm trees and pastel streaked skies during that time. And notice the sweet breeze moving through the trees. And take a deep breath or two.

So I guess I did make it outside today. But I was a few skips shy of the yellow brick road.

Reality Bites

Home. A mix of sensations as we return from the long journey. Relief to have a sturdy changing table instead of the precarious balancing act of changing pad atop various luggage pieces in the back of the Prius. Please to witness.

Relief to see the brown dog (especially now since he's without his big old Elizabethian collar!) Relief to be in our comfy bed. And bhb to be in his own bed too.

But alot of ah well's too...

I feel sad to loose that day-to-day-what-is-next, it's-all-new and especially the every meal is something pretty darn delicious and likely dairy and wheat based. I suspect my body is excited to see about some veg and hiking again but (sniff) I'm going to miss you scone.

I think the hardest adjustment involved in a homecoming is all of the crap that you got to leave sitting on the desk and on kitchen counter and especially on all of the mental shelves that get alerted to your arrival the moment your plane lands or the car hits city limits. All of the to-do's, don't forget's and in my case the 'why has it taken 2 months to get to Target to get the springy rod thing for the bathroom drapes?' kinda thinking. I can tell you that springee rod didn't get one iota of my time for two weeks and now it along with a hundred other stupid tiny things are sitting on my head again like one of those funny little marmots.

And BB (before Baby) that list was long and hard. Now? That list is long and staying long not getting touched. Tomorrow we'll be reading our new favorite book 'Is Your Mama a Llama?' and I'll look up in that mirthful way, look past the dog shedding in my direction, and admire the way the curtain is sorta perched on the window instead of hanging. And my choices are? Pretty much suck it up.

But we do have a new adventure that got rolling today that is pretty great. And likely to kick my ass and make for some good blog fun for any of y'all playing along.

Yes, I'm talking about the short film. Two friends have graciously offered their time to help us produce this thing. (ok well to be clear I begged and I'm a pest) but end of day it's a truly kind and magnanimous act to help us since even though I'm a damn good director,  I'm only a really mediocre producer and I'm producing along with them. But! Since I feel massive pressure to stay up and on top of it so as to not waste their time I actually think it might work. Think. Hope. Think. Hope and Hope.

Let's refer to them going forward as the wonder twins. If they want me to reveal their secret identity, they can say so. But we met today and kicked off the process. T-minus two months and counting to gather a huge force of people to practically but-not-totally-but-pretty-much-donate their time to help, actors (preferably a famous one or two) to commit a bunch of lines to memory, places to trust us to shoot and not hurt the space we inhabit, equipment to pull out of thin air and just a melange of all around magic has to occur. I truly don't know how we're going to pull off this shoot - to do it properly we should have literally 10x the money we do.

Deep breath. So here's my first question to you guys. Anyone know any of the famous dudes on this list? Some are just stoopid famous and would likely never come near our set but you know what? Life is crazy and magical and who the hell knows, right? And so we're working that 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon here, if you've got a degree or two and want to share that connection, oh please do. Please email me at jane at turtledreams dot net.

It's a good script, it really is.

Peter Krause
Ron Livingston
Billy Crudup
Eddie Jemison
Justin Kirk

Richard Jenkins
Tony Shalhoub
Christopher Lloyd
Ian Holm
Philip Seymour Hoffman
Campbell Scott
Stanley Tucci
Morgan Freeman
Scott Adsit
Kevin Nealon
Kevin Bacon (Bacon number 0).

But before we get too excited about the new adventure, let's take a moment to look back at the one that just commenced. A few faves out of the literal 600 pictures we took:

The night we left...

Bear down.

 

I think this is one of the two of us is one of those shots that will live on. Not sure why.

Elf got loose among the giant redwoods.

This trip was given to us courtesy of 'family bonding' funds from California State. And while you wonder why we accept money from our broke-ass state, I must say family bonding it truly was.